Learning the Hard Way - Plymouth State University



Learning the Hard Way

by “Joe”

I came to Plymouth State College because it was within my budget, but also due to its reputation as a party school. We’ve all heard sayings like, “If we’re not wasted, a day is!” What first-year student could resist that image?

My first week here I lived it up. I wasn’t interested in school work yet. I was interested in tapped beer. I went to as many parties as I could. I talked to as many girls as would listen to me. The people at the parties all seemed so cool. Maybe that was because I had a few in me. Parties seemed to be the main thing on a lot of people’s minds. This was all fine and everything, but when classes started on Wednesday and the kids didn’t stop partying, it began to be a problem.

My friends, the ones from back home that attended Plymouth were all partying with me all the time. We all thought this was the most incredible thing, being on our own and doing as we pleased. But when it comes to friends, you tend to watch out for each other, making sure no one does anything stupid or no one gets hurt. Some began to drink more than others and this did not go unnoticed. At first we would kid the other person about drinking all the time; we didn’t think it was that big a deal. Eventually we would tell the person that he wasn’t going to drink “tonight”. We tried to say it in a joking manner, but with the utmost seriousness. No one wanted to see anyone get hurt from drinking too much.

I began to notice that I was drinking too much. Maybe I drank as much as the average college student, but it was too much for me. I would drink two or three days a week, mostly at parties. Normally I would wake up the next morning without feeling the effects of the night before. My tolerance for alcohol began to grow rapidly, too quickly for my liking. Now that I think about it, I did drink more than the average college student. I would become obnoxious when “Miller time” rolled around. My friends would be mad at me for days and of course I didn’t know why. It’s harder to make friends than to make enemies and boy did I make a lot of enemies. I know I have a bad temper, but when you add alcohol, it multiplies. People were becoming scared of me, and that made me feel really bad.

One night I went to a friend’s apartment and played a few drinking games. I guess I consumed about a half a case in 45 minutes. Then it was time to hit the parties. I drank another 12 or 13 beers at another party and I was feeling really good. A girl I knew had some sort of drink so I remember asking her if I could have some. I remember drinking the whole thing, but after that, the whole night was a blur. I do remember halfway through the night I saw the Spanish-American War on my wall and we were winning for a while. When I sobered up, I remembered some other things and made some connections I did not want to make.

The next day I decided not to drink any more. People said I wouldn’t last a day. I don’t really care. This is for me. I guess I had to hit bottom before I could see the problem.

At 2:00 in the morning the door slams shut. Raised voices are heard in the other room. I squeeze my pillow tight. I want the voices to stop. I don’t understand why this happens. It must be my fault. The dog enters my room and lies down at my feet waiting for silence, waiting to feel safe again. Soon there is quiet, but I know it won’t last long. If I listen I can make out the voices—a stern, disapproving one and a raspy one that doesn’t make any sense. I wish they would stop fighting.

For as long as I can remember, my father has drank. He drank when the football game was on. Didn’t all fathers drink while watching the game? My father has been a professional musician for 35 years. He graduated at the top of his class at Berkley School of Music. He’s always been part of the night life in the clubs. Maybe that’s where it started.

My parents got divorced when I was in the second grade. I had some idea what divorce meant. It meant the yelling would stop. That was the end of the memories with my father. He didn’t bother coming around any more. When I finally heard from him again he was living in Massachusetts with some woman. The truth was he would stay there when he could. He was living in his car most of the time. That lasted a year or two until he saved enough money one winter to move into a hotel room. He was out of a job, mainly because he was too hung over to make it to work in the morning and drumming jobs were few and far between.

The hotel was nice, better than the car, but the bottle managed to mess things up again. After six or seven years without him, my mother got a phone call one night. My father was in the hospital. I remember the day well—September 19th—my birthday. The story is that he went into a bar and four or five guys beat him up and stole his money. I knew this wouldn’t be the last time I would get him out of trouble.

Shortly after that, my father moved out of the hotel. He found a place in Portsmouth and managed to get a full time job. he began to come over on Saturday mornings with doughnuts from the supermarket. He was looking better, but he still drank quite a bit.

The problem with alcoholics is they cannot face tough situations without a drink. My father would come over every Christmas after my grandmother and her husband left because he could not get along with her husband. He would arrive totally intoxicated, having been drinking since the night before. My mother, father and I would exchange gifts and words.

Christmas was not the only event my father celebrated in this way. He loved arriving late to my birthday parties with a few in him. He got me nice presents, but that wasn’t what I really needed. He never came to any of my games or went to any school events. In a way I didn’t want him to come. I was afraid he would embarrass me.

One evening I got a phone call. My father was on the other end, drink and trying to tell me something. I jumped into my car and went over. His apartment had been broken into. When I arrived I found my father standing on the lawn with the cat in his arms. The policeman was trying to ask him questions, but he was too drunk to answer them. I walked over to where another police officer was trying to get into the apartment. I couldn’t open the front door which was somehow pinned shut due to the way the burglars had tried to break in. I exploded. I had never been so mad. I told the officer to step aside and kicked the door off its hinges. Why does this always happen to him? To me?

I grew up learning to do things on my own. I never had that Ward Cleaver figure in my life. When I see other families I wonder what it might have been like growing up in a family atmosphere. I wonder what a family vacation feels like. I want better for my kids.

My father still calls up every ten minutes when he is drunk, but it’s mostly on the weekends now. I guess he is just lonely. I go over sometimes on Sundays and eat dinner at his apartment, but I don’t stay long. I can’t stand him when he’s drunk.

In the past few weeks I have still gone to plenty of parties, and I have a great time. People seem to like me better now also . Funny how everything has changed. The guys I used think were cool (the ones at the parties) are really jerks looking for the drunk girls to have a good time with. I stand around at parties, soda in my hand, watching the people around me. I still can’t help thinking that a short time ago I was the fool on the floor, the one who didn’t know where he was.

I don’t want to grow up like my father.

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